The British Columbia Technical and Research Committee on Reclamation originated in the early 1970's, in response to a demonstrated need in BC for greater government-industry communications in the area of environmental protection and reclamation associated with mining.

41st Annual Mine Reclamation Symposium: A Success

41st Annual Mine Reclamation Symposium:2018 A Great Success

Download the 2018 NR1-TRCR News Release with this key quote from the 2018 Chair, Warn Franklin:

Warn Franklin – 2018 TRCR Chair

“The TRCR successfully hosted its 41st annual Mine Reclamation Symposium in Williams Lake from September 17 to September 20 with more than 170 delegates attending the program which included a workshop and field trip on mine reclamation at Mount Polley, two days of technical presentations and the B.C. Mine Reclamation Awards banquet.” says Warn Franklin, 2018 chair of the TRCR.

“This year, the Jake McDonald Annual Mine Reclamation Award was presented to Teck Highland Valley Copper Partnership for its use of tailings ponds and pit lakes at its mine near the town of Logan Lake, B.C. for aquatic habitat and as passive water treatment facilities.”

Conference Highlights

The 2018 TRCR Mine Reclamation Symposium was held at the Cariboo Recreation Centre in Williams Lake, BC from September 17 to September 20, 2018.

The Symposium included an excellent 4 day program commencing on the 17th with a full-day Workshop of Mount Polley Mine Course, presented by Lyn Anglin, Imperial Metals, Luke Moger and Colleen Hughes, Mount Polley mine.

Colleen Hughes at the Mount Polley Workshop

On September 18th, a field tour of Imperial Mine’s operating Mt. Polley Mine, was held to view the remediation of Tailings Storage Facility Embankment Failure Impacted Areas both for aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems, water management and treatment and reclamation research programs on mine lands using biosolids. Thereafter, a terrific meal was held at the Likely Pub in Likely, BC.

Tour group listening to guides at the Hazeltine Creek Fish Weir

Mt. Polley Tour group

Then on September 19th and 20th the technical paper conference commenced with presentations of (21) technical papers (available on UBC cIRCLE with more information on our publications page), and with (10) exhibitors available to discuss their services and products (see below for list and contacts).

A huge thank you goes out to the Cantrav Events team (Missy Preston, Jacynta Michelle and others) who helped organize the field tour, conference, registration and venue with professional aplomb. We also appreciated the many bus and shuttle drivers that were provided throughout the conference.

Another major thank you also goes out to Mt. Polley Mining Corporation for the Monday Workshop and Tuesday Field tour of the restoration efforts that took place at the mine after the 2014 tailings embankment failure – to all workshop leaders, tour guides and the Likely Pub food and bar purveyors- great job!

Listing of the exhibitors and their websites, and the First Nation attendees that were provided with sponsored registration are found below.

On September 19th, an evening of great food, camaraderie, annual student scholarships, reclamation awards recognition, and networking of attendees was held at the Annual Awards banquet in the Gibraltar room at the Cariboo Recreation Centre.

During the evening proceedings, Warn Franklin chaired the event noting the TRCR Committee members that were in attendance, and introduced the guest of honour, Mayor Walt Cobb of Williams Lake who gave a speech thanking the Mount Polley crew for doing such a great job restoring the impacted areas of the tailings embankment breach in 2014.

During the banquet, Wendy Gardner, TRCR Scholarship Chair from the Thompson Rivers University (TRU) presented the 2017 and 2018 Jake McDonald Scholarships for Mine Reclamation to deserving students. They are: Lina Xie, a doctoral mining engineering student at the University of British Columbia; Landon Benson, master of science in ecological restoration student at Simon Fraser University; Cameron Weatherhead, a third year mining engineering student at BCIT and Hailey Make, a fourth year natural resources sciences student at Thompson Rivers University.

Scholarship Winners: (l-r) Cameron Weatherhead, a third year mining engineering student at BCIT; Landon Benson, master of science in ecological restoration student at Simon Fraser University and Hailey Make, a fourth year natural resources sciences student at Thompson Rivers University

Wendy Gardner with Lina Xie, doctoral mining engineering student at the University of British Columbia

Bill Price, NRCan then presented the Tony Milligan Book Award for Best Paper in the previous year (2016) to Michelle Harris for her paper entitled “Impacts of One Time Biosolids and Fertilizer Application on Long-Term Metal and Nutrient Concentrations on Two Tailings Ponds in the BC Southern Interior”by author’s Michelle Harris, Wendy Gardner and Tom Pypker.

Michelle Harris – winner of the 2018 Millligan Book Award

TRCR Annual Reclamation Awards:

Jennifer McConnachie, Manager, Reclamation with the British Columbia Ministry of Energy, Mines and Petroleum Resources was on hand to present the annual reclamation awards beginning with a recap of the 2015 award that was presented in Penticton in September, 2016.

She reported that due to wild fire activity and cancellation of the Symposium in 2017, no reclamation awards were presented and therefore, the award for outstanding achievement for reclamation at a metal mine from 2016 receives the keeper trophy. This was presented to Thompson Creek Metals Company Inc. for outstanding reclamation achievements at the Mt. Milligan Mine.

The keeper trophy for the safe return of the Jake McDonald Jade award from 2016 was presented to Mt. Milligan mine.

On behalf of the Technical and Research Committee on Reclamation, Jennifer indicated it was her pleasure to announce two awards for work completed in 2017, or over a longer period of time as adjudicated by the 2018 TRCR Award Nomination committee.

Teck Coal Ltd. was presented with the Coal Reclamation Award for its reclamation of Horseshoe Ridge at Line Creek Operations located between the towns of Sparwood and Elkford in southeastern B.C. The company engaged with local communities, the Ktunaxa Nation, and regulatory agencies to develop a new approach to reclamation. One example of the approach to increase biodiversity is in the variety of plant species used – in 2013 and 2014, for example, approximately 250,000 seedlings including 34 different native and culturally important species were planted. Preliminary results from monitoring indicate that this new approach is working.

Warn Franklin of Teck Coal was presented with the Award by Jennifer McConnachie.

The Jake McDonald Annual Mine Reclamation Award was presented to Teck Highland Valley Copper Partnership for its use of tailings ponds and pit lakes at its mine near the town of Logan Lake, B.C. for aquatic habitat and as passive water treatment facilities. “The resulting progressive reclamation of the Bethlehem, Trojan, and Highmont tailings ponds, and the Huestis, Iona, and Jersey pit lakes that has occurred over 20 years demonstrates that Highland Valley Copper is a global leader in this area of mine reclamation science,” noted Jennifer McConnachie, Chair of the TRCR Awards Subcommittee. “It is for their work in reclamation research and biomonitoring with the goal of achieving productive end land uses and improving water quality for aquatic mine facilities that we are recognizing Highland Valley Copper today.” The results of the reclamation include a self-sustaining rainbow trout fishery, reduction of metals such as molybdenum and copper in water, and use of the ponds by a diverse animal population including 150 bird species.